Travelling elsewhere to rob somebody at home

“BRUSSELS – EU citizens are losing some €1.5 billion every year as criminals siphon off their money through the fraudulent use of debit and credit cards.

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“A new report released on Monday (7 December) by the EU police agency Europol found that the thefts most often occur in the United States.

” “The majority of illegal face-to-face card transactions affecting the European Union take place overseas, mainly in the United States,” noted the Hague-based agency.

“Embedded security features on EU cards such as chips and pin technology are easily bypassed in the United States.

“Criminals exploit the weaknesses in America because some US-based cash machines are not fully compliant to a global security standard based on chip technology, known as EMV.

” “Due to this phenomenon, and the lack of specific agreements on reimbursement of losses caused by less protected terminals, the majority of the loss burden caused by this fraud is on the EU card issuers,” said Europol.

“The lax security feature on cash machines is not unique to the United States.

“The agency found organised gangs also steal the money using the same techniques in the Dominican Republic, Columbia, Russia, Brazil and Mexico.

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